2008: 12% of EU turnover online

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Forecasts made some years ago about the growth of E-Commerce (by Forrester if I remember well) were estimating that in 2010 10% of the business would be realized online. It seems that such predictions were rather pessimistic: according to a Eurostat press release published on Jan 19, 2010 E-Commerce in the EU accounted in 2008 already for 12% of enterprises' turnover. According to the same report 93% of the European enterprises have access to the Internet (champions were Finland (100%), Denmark, Austria and Slovakia (all 98%) and Germany (97%) and 82% have also access to fixed broadband connection with the highest percentages in Finland (94%), Spain and Malta (both 93%) and France (92%). As to the E-Commerce turnover by destination the largest percentage in the EU is done within the country (73% average); 19% is realized with other EU countries and 8% outside the EU. I expect in 2010 that EU E-Commerce will exceed 15% of the total turnover in the union.